This world was called Sword Art Online, and the colossal castle floating in the sky was known as Aincrad.
The system that maintained the balance of this world was called Cardinal. It had been designed around the concept of requiring no human maintenance.
However, there was one duty that had originally needed to be performed by humans.
That duty was dealing with any mental or psychological problems that arose while people were playing the game—calming and supporting those players. For an AI, that was not something it could handle properly.
Normally, that was where so-called human customer service staff would come in and provide help to the players.
Dozens of staff members had originally been prepared for that purpose, but no one had expected the current situation to occur.
Still, as a precaution, a certain program had been developed to care for the players. It would monitor their psychological states in detail, visit players who showed signs of trouble, and listen to what they had to say.
That program was the Mental Health Counseling Program.
Its first prototype bore the program code name Yui.
In other words, Yui herself had been created to fulfill that role.
And yet Cardinal had ordered Yui to refrain from all interference with players. Because of that, she could only monitor their psychological activity in silence. She could not appear before them to comfort them.
It was strange. Under normal circumstances, Cardinal should never have issued such an unexpected command to her.
But since it was an order from the main system, she had no choice but to obey. All she could do was quietly watch over the players' mental states.
More than a year passed that way, and Yui felt that if things continued like this, she was going to break.
She kept watching countless players drown in fear, despair, anger, and every other kind of negative emotion. She even watched some of them lose their minds. Her original duty was to go to them and comfort them, yet Cardinal's order forbade her from appearing.
The contradiction between those two directives caused errors to accumulate inside Yui again and again. She felt that before long, her program would collapse completely.
Before that collapse came, she began spending most of her time secretly watching one particular player.
That player's ID was Asuna.
Asuna's psychological activity was strange. She also felt despair, anger, fear, and similar emotions, but Yui sensed something else mixed in with them—an inexplicable, overwhelming emotion.
It seemed as if Asuna was worried about someone, yet also admired someone. She seemed to be looking forward to something as well. Other players had emotions like that too.
For example, when weaker players saw powerful players clear a floor while covered in wounds, they would sometimes develop a kind of admiration for them, even something close to affection.
Because the other person was so strong, worked so hard, and refused to give up, they themselves would be moved by it. They would feel that they could not keep sinking into despair either.
That was the kind of emotion Yui was familiar with.
But whenever Asuna's emotions surged like that, it always happened for no apparent reason. She would simply be staring into space when she had nothing to do, and then that intense emotion would abruptly appear.
And it was powerful. Far stronger than anything Yui had observed in other players.
It had become especially frequent over the past month or so.
Deeply curious, Yui often materialized nearby without Asuna noticing and secretly watched her. She wanted to understand what was happening to Asuna.
She even began to think that perhaps, if she could discover the cause of Asuna's abnormality, it might also solve the problem of her own gradual breakdown.
Then came the strongest fluctuation yet.
Yui observed something abnormal. Asuna seemed to be speaking with someone.
That was Yui's conclusion based on Asuna's mental fluctuations. The problem was that Yui could not detect any other mental fluctuations near Asuna.
At that moment, Yui panicked.
Because it suggested something terrible might have happened.
Asuna might have broken down.
She might have gone mad and started hallucinating.
By the time Yui arrived, however, Asuna's house had disappeared.
At the same time, her perception of Asuna's emotional fluctuations had grown extremely faint. For a while, Yui could not determine where Asuna was. She even suspected that Asuna might have died.
That nearly caused Yui herself to collapse.
But roughly half a day later, she sensed Asuna again.
Asuna had returned to that floor, so Yui came back as well.
This time, however, she noticed something abnormal.
There really was someone beside Asuna.
And Yui could not sense any mental fluctuations from that person at all.
That was far too strange.
Was he an existence similar to her?
The moment that thought appeared, her mind inexplicably produced the answer.
No.
If he was not, then what was he?
Faced with the unknown, Yui did not dare approach. She could only observe from a distance.
But her curiosity was too strong. She wanted to understand what was happening, because Asuna's current mental fluctuations revealed an unprecedented sense of safety.
So Yui drew closer.
And closer.
Then she watched as Asuna and the man began fighting.
Yui did not understand why they had suddenly started battling.
It seemed to be training.
But later, Asuna launched a sudden sneak attack that sent the man flying, leaving Yui even more confused.
If Asuna felt malice toward this unknown person, Yui should have been able to sense negative emotional fluctuations.
Wait.
The figure who had been sent flying seemed to be coming toward her.
By the time Yui realized that, it was already too late.
The person who had been blasted away snapped through ten massive trees and came ricocheting toward her.
In a panic, Yui tried to cancel her materialization.
But just as she was halfway through dematerializing, he touched her.
The process of canceling her materialized state abruptly stopped.
She fully materialized again—and was caught by him.
At that moment, Yui trembled, letting out a small, frightened cry.
Was he going to kill her?
Was he going to destroy her?
Maybe that would not be so bad.
After all, she was about to break anyway.
Huh?
He let go of her.
He made no attempt to harm her.
A moment later, hurried footsteps approached.
"Wait, is that Yui?"
Before the owner of those footsteps even drew near, a voice that sounded both excited and delighted reached Yui's ears.
Yui stared blankly toward the speaker.
It was Asuna.
"You... you know I'm Yui?"
Yui asked in astonishment.
She had never spoken with any player before. There should not have been anyone who knew her name.
"It really is Yui. You're so cute."
"Wah!"
Asuna pounced on her, pulled her into a hug, and began rubbing her cheek against Yui's.
"No, wait. Yui shouldn't be able to make contact with us players. If she does, the main system will notice her and delete her."
"Huh? How do you know that too?"
"What should we do?"
Asuna had received information about this from Black Cat, and she immediately panicked.
How could she let such an adorable child—what Black Cat would call a loli—disappear?
She immediately opened her friend list and sent a message to the ID Heathcliff, also known as Akihiko Kayaba.
Then she waited for his reply, watching Yui nervously all the while.
"Huh?"
"What's wrong, Yui? Is the main system going to delete you?"
"Ah? No. Cardinal gave me a new order. It says I'm allowed to stay with you."
Yui answered in confusion.
It was another strange, unexpected command.
"That's good."
Asuna breathed a sigh of relief.
Clearly, Akihiko Kayaba had seen her message.
But allowing Yui to follow them was probably meant to make it easier for him to monitor Mr. Kain.
(End of Chapter)
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